John August

Words on the page

On accident, by accident

Words on the page

One of the random quirks of language that pops up. Fill in the blank:

JOHN

Who opened my mail?

MARY

Sorry. I did it __ accident. I just wasn’t paying attention.

If you said “on accident,” you’re very likely under 30 years old.

In fact, among Americans in that age group, it’s becoming more common than the traditional “by accident.” And linguists [don’t know why](http://www.inst.at/trans/16Nr/01_4/barratt16.htm):

> Finally, why “on accident” arose is also unclear. Obviously, “on purpose” may have played a role in supplying an analogical form (I didn’t break the window on purpose; I broke it on accident). But “by accident” and “on purpose” have existed for hundreds of years without one causing the other to change prepositions, and we don’t hear “by purpose,” so why did the change happen when it did and why did the change have the direction it did rather than the other way round (in other words, to “by accident” & “by purpose”)?

My hunch? Start looking at popular kids’ TV shows and see when they started using it.

Gender-specific douchery

Video, Words on the page

In this [YouTube clip](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWUcVj31QaM&feature=PlayList&p=FC7BDC8774187EAE&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=53), Jonathan Coulton gives some backstory on the Portal videogame before performing “Still Alive.”

COULTON

This song is sung by one of the characters in the game. She’s an artificial intelligence, and she’s kind of an asshole.

That got a laugh, and for good reason: we so rarely refer to women as assholes.

And I don’t really know why. There are many gender-specific terms for hateful men and women, so it’s surprising that one which should be equally-applicable is almost always used for men only.

And yes, I got the sheet music to “Still Alive.”

On the present tense

Follow Up, Words on the page

One sentence in [yesterday’s screencast](http://johnaugust.com/archives/2009/scene-description) drew a number of questions in the comments section:

Seated at a laptop computer, Phil is watching live video from a tiny camera in Mike’s headset.

First off, that’s not passive voice, as some readers suggested. Passive voice would reverse subject and object, so the clause would be…

...live video from a tiny camera in Mike’s headset is being watched by Phil.

…which is truly awful. Rather, “Phil is watching” is called present continuous, or present progressive. You can almost always substitute the simple present tense.

Seated at a laptop computer, Phil watches live video from a tiny camera in Mike’s headset.

And that’s fine.

But what I like about present progressive in this case is that it implies that he’s been doing this for a while, and that he’s not completing the action in this moment. Consider the difference between these two sentences:

Mary is cutting coupons.

Mary cuts coupons.

With the second one, you get the sense she might have put the scissors back in the drawer and moved on to something else. Or that her coupon-cutting is something she routinely does, perhaps as a character trait. (“Well, you know Mary. She cuts coupons.”)

Remember, screenwriting is about what is happening at exactly this moment. Traditional fiction is rarely written in this super-present tense, which may be why some readers find screenplays weird. ((Also worth noting: Many languages don’t have the same plethora of pseudo-tenses as English, or use them differently. A non-native speaker will find they don’t match up particularly well. Q: “Did she have dinner?” A: “She does.”))

For screenwriting, the most useful thing about the present progressive is that it’s interruptible:

Bob is scrubbing the ketchup out of his hair when he hears a SCREAM.

That’s handy.

Here’s the thing: No screenwriter is ever going to talk about the present progressive tense. It’s not a movie thing; it’s grammar esoterica. In fact, I had to look it up to make sure I was using the right term.

Rather, writers use the words and forms that best suit what they’re trying to do. In screenwriting, you’re always looking for the shortest, most elegant way to get the point across — which is usually the simplest. Focus on getting the words to flow together naturally, rather than proscriptive rules.

Writing better scene description

How-To, Scriptcast, Video, Words on the page, Writing Process

My occasional [“How To” articles](http://johnaugust.com/archives/category/how-to) tend to get a good response, but it’s hard for me to show the difference between the process of writing and the product of writing. No matter how long the article, I can’t go through word-by-word, explaining my decisions. [Scrippets](http://scrippets.org) only go so far.

So today, something new. I work through a scene on video with the goal of improving the scene description. This is still very much an experiment, so let me know what you think.

As usual on YouTube, buttons in the bottom-right corner let you go full-screen and/or HD.